IT Internship Workbook
Getting and giving feedback in the workplace
As Alexandra Levit points out in her book,
They Don't Teach Corporate in College,
the school environment is highly structured and provides
feedback to each student on performance in the form of grades.
The performance expectation of a class is defined in the class
syllabus and your graded items clearly tell you how you are doing.
On the job, however, expectations of
performance are often more vague and feedback may come in various
forms at infrequent intervals, and then annually in a formal performance
evaluation documenting events well after the fact. In addition,
you are called upon by the nature of interactions and workplace
team interdependencies to communicate your expectations and
the impact of the performance of others on your work. Your
preparation for successfully handling these types of
communications begins with a basic understanding that they
exist, learning what they involve, and developing an appreciation
for what it is reasonable to expect. Here
we explore the nature of workplace communications
giving and getting frequent and meaningful feedback. Feedback is provided
by supervisors and management, but also by fellow employees. It is
also something you have to learn how to provide in ways that
facilitate teamwork and cooperation.
Your major homework project is a writing assignment related
to the concepts presented in this session. You'll
need to start keeping a daily journal of communications
observations you make at your internship job, including
your own
on-the-job experiences involving communication,
feedback, constructive criticism and conflict resolution.
You'll use this in assignment 7 to
form a paper reflecting on your observations,
reactions, and impressions.
Links you need to explore for this chapter: